Budapest revisited…
We did not do much while in beautiful Budapest; here is what we visited for the first time or revisited post our 1999 trip.
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We sadly discovered that public transport is free only for “seniors” of the European Union persuasion. While this makes sense, it was an expensive disappointment.
We did make use for the first time of the Google Maps public transport option and were blown away by it. If you type in your destination and say you want to get there via public transport, Google lists all the options for doing so. This includes bus, tram and Metro and the distance and time to walk between these if your routing requires a change. It includes times and whether the vehicle departed the last stop on time and whether the vehicle is full or not. I honestly do not know how we managed to cope in foreign cities in the past. It was like getting a fax machine for the first time!
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We revisited Memento Park. Wikipedia: “Memento Park is an open-air museum [that] deals with the presentation of the memories of Hungarian socialism. In this historical exhibition space, there are 41 public works of the years of socialism created in the style of socialist realism, which were removed from the streets of Budapest after the political system change in 1989-90. Many of the museum's sculptures are valuable and unique works of art, the works of sculptors known and recognized throughout Europe.”
Here’s what I wrote following our 1999 visit: “So we took the bus back to Moskva on our travel pass. And asked a tram driver how to get to Szoborpark (Statue Park): Gigantic Memorials from the Communist Dictatorship – also advertised as Tons of Socialism, this park contains communist-era statues removed from Budapest’s streets after the “change”. He radioed someone to make enquiries and then got out to direct us onto a tram and bus. He also looked at our brochure of the park, pointed at Stalin’s statue and said with disdain ‘idioot’. When Charl laughed he looked to him to confirm his assessment. Amusing. Tons of Socialism is a great idea (which would work well in post-apartheid South Africa where statues of past oppressors, along with road names, are being willy nilly removed), but too far out of town to be effective. Despite a pretentious, pompous design and huge entrance gate as gung ho / intended-to-be-stirring as the various statues, the statues themselves are too spread out to make the desired en masse impact, unfortunately. However, each statue in its own right was pretty impressive. We could not afford the guide book so did not get as much out of the experience as we would have liked, but thoroughly enjoyed the collection nonetheless. Huge and emotionally appealing / stirring.”
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Budapest was originally two cities: hilly Buda on the west bank of the Danube; flat Pest on the east. The cities were officially combined in 1873.
We spent some time on Castle Hill, admiring particularly Matthias Church and Fisherman’s Bastion, from the outside only.